Brian Jacokes

Brian Jacokes is a software engineer based in the Greater Boston area, currently an Engineering Manager at Plaid. He studied at MIT (BS in Mathematics and Computer Science, 2004-2008; M.Eng in Computer Science, 2007-2008) and represented the United States at the International Olympiad in Informatics in 2004, winning a gold medal (6th overall). He was part of the MIT team that won a gold medal (4th place) at the ACM ICPC World Finals 2007. His early career at Citadel Investment Group (Financial Technology Associate, 2008-2009) was followed by software engineering roles at Google, Parse, Dropbox, Bolt and Plaid.

Notes5

• Quant employment verification: CONFIRMED. Identity: the LinkedIn profile (linkedin.com/in/brian-jacokes-1b3a3a16) shows the same Brian Jacokes, MIT education (BS Mathematics & Computer Science 2004-2008; M.Eng CS 2007-2008) matching the IOI/CPhOF/ICPC records for the USA-2004 contestant. Employment evidence: the profile lists Financial Technology Associate at Citadel Investment Group, Chicago, Jul 2008-Sep 2009 - an actual full-time role, not a student program. Employer classification: Citadel Investment Group (Citadel LLC) is an American hedge fund; its affiliate Citadel Securities is a market maker (Wikipedia, Citadel LLC). Caveat: the Citadel role and its dates are index/enrichment-sourced (LinkedIn-derived), not corroborated by an independent primary source; no quant-research or trading-strategy evidence for the role itself beyond the employer's hedge-fund classification, and the 'Financial Technology Associate' title sits in technology rather than an investment desk. No other quantitative-finance employer appears in the timeline.Sep 17, 2026
• Worked as Financial Technology Associate at Citadel Investment Group in Chicago (Jul 2008-Sep 2009), immediately after graduating MIT; Citadel is a hedge fund / market maker.Jul 2008
• Won a gold medal (rank 6 overall) for the United States at IOI 2004, the International Olympiad in Informatics.2004
• Was the third engineer at Parse, building push notification and hosting products; Parse was acquired by Facebook in April 2013.2013
• Holds BS in Mathematics and Computer Science (2004-2008) and M.Eng in Computer Science (2007-2008) from MIT.2008
• Part of the MIT team that won gold (4th place) at the ACM ICPC World Finals 2007.2007
• Joined Bolt when the team was under 10 people and Bolt Checkout was pre-launch (2016-2017).2016
• IOI statistics registry records him as a 2004 contestant for the United States.2004
• Reached the top-48 of the TopCoder Collegiate Challenge Algorithm competition in 2006.2006
• Based in the Greater Boston area; LinkedIn shows 739 connections and 759 followers.2026